


First Impressions

by Cadhla



Category: In Other Lands - Sarah Rees Brennan
Genre: Character Study, Gen, M/M, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Thoughtful Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-11 02:35:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12925503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cadhla/pseuds/Cadhla
Summary: Elliot and Luke and how often they were similar and how often they were not.





	First Impressions

**Author's Note:**

  * For [meretricula](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meretricula/gifts).



By the time Elliot Schafer was eight years old, he knew two things without needing to stop and think about them, ever: He knew that people were awful, and he knew that it didn’t matter, because he was smarter than all of them and someday he was going to have a wonderful life, in a wonderful place, where all of the awful people weren’t. They would be somewhere else. Where, exactly, “else” was going to be wasn’t his problem, because he was going to be in the wonderful place without them. Their absence would only make it more amazing. They would probably cry themselves to sleep at night, yearning for a wonderful place that they could never be.

Well. Maybe not that. He had a fair bit of experience with crying himself to sleep, and he didn’t like it, and even though all of those people were awful and he hated them and he never wanted to see them again, maybe expecting them to cry themselves to sleep was cruel. He tried not to be cruel. He had a dim feeling that cruelty was something that would come easily to him, if he ever allowed himself to get into the habit, and he didn’t want it. So he tried to lean away, and waited for the day when him being smarter and brighter and better would be worth something more than a pounding.

That day seemed to be a long time coming.

By the time Luke Sunborn was eight years old, he knew two things all the way down to the bottom of his bones, which was something Rachel liked to say when she was being absolutely sure: He knew that people were essentially good, and he knew that it didn’t matter, because he was a Sunborn. He was bright and valiant and true, and no one who ever looked at him saw anything more than the color of his hair and the brightness of his banner. He could burn the world and they’d cheer and applaud and shout his name in terrifying ecstasy, like they hadn’t really wanted the world anyway, but had just been waiting for someone to come along and take care of it for them.

He didn’t feel sorry for himself, most days. There were worse things to be than a Sunborn: There were worse burdens to bear than the weight of expectations. It’s just that there were so many expectations, and everyone had more, and every time he met someone knew they looked at him like they were measuring him for a statue, a suit of armor, and a coffin, all at the same time. He wasn’t sure any of them ever really saw him behind the wall of expectations they had so carefully constructed for their own edification. He wasn’t sure they’d like him if they did. So he learned to smile no matter what was going on around him, and waited for the day when him being considered smarter, and brighter, and better would stop feeling like a burden.

That day seemed to be a long time coming.

By the time Serene-Heart-in-the-Chaos-of-Battle was eight years old, she knew many things with the bright and unswerving certainty of a warrior born. Most of them involved flensing things. She had no trouble whatsoever sleeping at night, and wouldn’t have understood the question if someone had asked her whether she did. If she waited for anything, it was for the day when she would be able to show the world that she was so much smarter, and brighter, and better than anyone before her had been, than anyone who came after her would ever be.

It should be somewhat obvious, at this stage, that this is not her story. This was not as much of a misfortune as it might initially seem: Serene will have other stories, other moments, and other adventures ahead of her. They are the three pieces to a braid, these bright and brilliant children, and without all the plaits, the weaving cannot hold. Still, we will leave her be, for now, to sleep and dream of murder in her narrow warrior’s bed.

By the time Elliot was eleven, he had decided that all his earlier decisions had been good, and true, and accurate, and more, that any social choices he might have limited by making them had been social choices he hadn’t really wanted anyway, since the people who were standing on the other side of his good regard were all, to a one, absolutely dreadful. The day when he would go to the wonderful place seemed no closer, and he was beginning to suspect that perhaps that was the one thing he’d managed to get wrong. That was...troubling. The idea that his current loneliness might extend into the future was terrifying, if he allowed himself to think about it too much, and so he simply didn’t, and continued on unswerving in his belief that someday, things would change for the better. Someday, he would understand, and be understood in equal measure.

Someday.

By the time Luke was eleven, he had seen his future mapped out ahead of him like a cartographer’s masterpiece, all shining silver against a backdrop of purest, priceless gold. He knew where he would study and what his marks would be; he knew he would carry a sword, raise a banner, challenge the world to bend before him and, when it inevitably bent, challenge it again to rise up better and stronger than before. He knew he would be a hero. He knew he didn’t have a choice. Still, he hoped that someday, he would find an uncharted corner of the map, a place where he could write his own notations. Someday, he would understand, and be understood in equal measure.

Two boys who, when they turned thirteen, found the way into a grand adventure. One packed a bag, received kisses from his relations, turned his face into the light and looked grave and solemn and shining in the morning sun. One was left in a field by a teacher who didn’t much care for him anyway, and would be grateful to drive back to the school without his whinging and antagonizing of the other children, none of whom issued a single word of complaint over the fact that one of their peers had just been left in the countryside, potentially to die of exposure.

There are no prizes for guessing which is which, although it should be noted that many of Elliot’s peers felt it was substantially more likely that exposure would die of him.

Elliot’s first impression of Luke, while well-documented, should still be reiterated as one of muscles and hair and privilege and inconvenient heroism. Luke’s first impression of Elliot was much like a hunting hound’s idea of a very angry, somewhat muddy and irritated kitten: All claws and eyes and far too much bristling hair. Neither of them was entirely wrong. Neither of them was entirely right, either. This is the nature of impressions: they are made by the exterior, and lack certain essential, ineluctable detail.

It is also the nature of impressions to harden as they age, becoming more and more difficult to change. This is why the age of one’s peers is sometimes surprising, for deep down, they will always be eight and dreaming of comfort, or eleven and dreaming of companionship, or thirteen and dreaming of dry socks and a ride back to civilization.

Here is where first impressions failed them both:

Heroism is a burden as much as a blessing. Both are something to be borne.

Claws are signs not only of aggression, but of fear, and the need to defend.

Everyone is frightened, when cast away from home. So here, then, were two boys, both young, both looking for something to cleave to, both sure that they would never find it. And bit by bit, they did precisely that, one cutting comment or inconvenient rescue at a time. Bit by bit, they found their way to a place where being smarter, and brighter, and better was not a burden, but something shared between them, and between their third, who had never been sensible enough to be afraid, and was hence largely chasing other stories. Fifteen and sympathy; seventeen and love; nineteen and that nasty business with the werewolves; twenty-one and that nastier business with the dragons.

Home is a wonderful place, if you can get there.

And if your socks are dry.


End file.
